Helping our HIV+ Thai Children complete school

For the past two and half years, the pandemic has thrown many roadblocks and hurdles in front of us as we work towards helping our children receive a quality education.  At the pandemic's start, no one knew how to survive this illness. In the beginning, all schools closed, and the educational system had to develop online programs quickly.  Sadly, though this helped our children's educational development, it was less than perfect. 

During this period, the educational system was challenged to work closely with the parents, children, and community members. Their objective was to ensure quality education and keep our children safe from COVID, which led to many initiatives, from in-school classes with a limited number of children to some months with in-school classes and others with online classes. One missing element in this process was the socialization of our children.  As much as we tried to share why we needed to control the socialization of our children, depression came into play.  

Dealing with this pandemic was a learning process for the school system and our foundation's staff. After two and a half years, I am happy to report that our children got through these dark periods and are thriving in these schools. 

Our final challenge is to provide a quality education for our children; financial resources have dropped. We are now confronted with making the hard decision of relocating our children to other NGOs that will be able to provide the best educational opportunities for their future. When all is said and done, what is best for our children's future is the decision we need to make.